Ayyam Gallery Dubai (Al Quoz) is pleased to announce Driven by Storms (Ali’s Boat), a solo exhibition by one of the most prominent Iraqi artists working in the diaspora today, Sadik Kwaish Alfraji. Much of Alfraji’s oeuvre addresses the vulnerability of human existence and speaks of loss, exile, fragmentation, and displacement. Curated by Nat Muller, the show premiers an exciting new body of work the artist has grouped around the theme of ‘Ali’s Boat,’ based on a drawing his young nephew, Ali, gave him on a family visit to Baghdad in 2009.
The exhibition includes a series of large-scale paintings, charcoal drawings, artist diary sketches, and stop motion video animation in which the artist blends his distinct aesthetics with that of his young nephew, and of his own children. The plight of a young boy wishing to escape the horrors of present-day Iraq is merged with the artist’s own predicament as an exile, unable to return home. In a childlike style—made all the more poignant by the melancholy sadness and gravitas so characteristic of Alfraji’s work—the pieces draw on crucial existential questions such as the wish to live in peace and security, the pursuit of happiness and self-fulfillment, and the possibility to dream.
